Even from a distance, he can recognize the look in Thomas Greiss’ eyes, can identify the confidence in his manner, can see how profoundly the roar of the home crowd sustains Greiss, how deeply the trust of his teammates nourishes him.

A goalie knows what a goalie knows, after all.

“If I could only have one more spring,” Chico Resch says, the words both wishful and wistful, “like the spring that Thomas is having … Oh, wow.”

Resch, of course, is one of the few people who know exactly what Greiss is seeing, and hearing, and feeling, because once upon a hockey spring it was Resch who was the hot goalie, it was Resch who performed nightly miracles and kissed the goal posts in gratitude after every victory.

All these years later, if you drive by what used to be Nassau Coliseum, if you listen hard enough, you might swear you can still hear the chants – “CHEEEE-CO! CHEEEE-CO! CHEEEE-CO!” – bouncing along Hempstead Turnpike.

All these years later, Chico Resch looks at what Thomas Greiss has done across these seven playoff nights for the Islanders, and it’s enough to transport him to 1975, to the Islanders’ first amazing rush of success. He knows what it is to fall out of the sky – Resch as a rookie, Greiss as a journeyman – and replace a reliable starter – Billy Smith in ’75, Jaroslav Halak in ’16 – and take temporary residence in …

“Look, I hate the word, but let’s call it what it is: Thomas is in The Zone,” Resch says. “It’s a mysterious place, and you’re never quite sure how you get there, but once you’re there, you never want to leave.”

He laughs.

“It never lasts,” Resch says. “But as long as it does …”

As long as it does, a hot goaltender can change everything. There is really nothing else like it in team sports. Daniel Murphy carried the Mets in October, but even he had help: Jacob deGrom, Noah Syndergaard. A hot quarterback? He’s still reliant on someone else catching his passes.

Dominique Wilkins once scored 47 points in Game 7 of the 1988 NBA playoffs, which was nice; Larry Bird scored 34, which was better. The Celtics won the game.

But a goalie, as long as he’s keeping pucks out, can be something we almost never see in sports: invincible.

“It’s the meshing of the mental and the physical,” Resch says. “As an athlete, there are times you think things might turn out well, but when you are in the kind of place Thomas is in, you know it will. Better, your teammates know it. And then the fans sense it. That happened to us in ’75. You can see it happening for them now.”

It was Game 4 of the ’75 Eastern semis when Al Arbour famously turned to Glenn Resch – given his nickname because of his resemblance to Freddie Prinze – with the Isles down 0-3 to the Penguins. You know what happened then: The Islanders won four straight, including a 1-0 gem in Game 7. They fell behind 0-3 to the Flyers in the conference finals, won three straight, and set the foundation for a dynasty.

By then, Smith would reclaim his job, keep it for all four Cups. Resch had a couple of All-Star seasons after ’75, but never again reached the rarefied air of ’75. Still, his ears still ring from that forever spring, and his heart is full watching another Islanders team on a roll – with Greiss wearing Chico’s old No. 1 sweater.

Game 1 against the Lightning underlined the yin and yang of goaltending, Greiss on one side playing with swagger, Ben Bishop on the other ultimately being pulled.

“When you’re going as Thomas is, you almost shout at the opponent: ‘Keep it coming! Keep it coming!’” Resch says. “Even when you let a goal or two, your mindset is still: ‘I’m stopping the next one.’ Meanwhile, on the other side, you let up a softy and you say: ‘Please don’t shoot, please don’t shoot.’”

He laughs.

“And you know what? When you’re on the other side of this, a goalie facing someone playing as well as Thomas, you see it, too. You feel it. And you say, ‘Uh oh.’ If he’s going to be perfect, I have to be better than perfect.

“And then,” he says, “you’ve got ‘em.”

The roll ended short of a Cup in ’75. The Islanders famously ran into Kate Smith in Game 7 – and the Broad Street Bullies had a little something to say about that, too.

“That’s the thing,” Resch says. “A good team playing great isn’t going to beat you when your goalie is that good. You need a great team playing great. Maybe the Capitals are that team this year. Or maybe Thomas can keep this going.”

He pauses. Forty-one years can speed by in an eyeblink.

“But it’s sure gonna be fun watching him try, isn’t it?”